Contest winner + Random Raptor + New poll gauges expectations

First up let’s announce the contest winner. We ran a SQL query which randomly selected one comment from the 199 that were submitted. Just for fun we’ve shown 4 other people who came oh so close to winning….

Jon: The Raptors will win a first round series this year because of the improved rebounding and with having JO and CB4 as the defensive anchors.

Hubert

Richard

Nadir Chaudhry

Joey

So congratulations to Jon (Comment #149) for winning the free tickets. We’ll try snapping his picture and putting it on the site. Remember if he can’t make it for whatever reason, we’ll then give the tickets to #2 and so on so forth. Thanks for participating and we’ll have another draw very soon.

Staying with the random theme, we added a new feature to the website called Random Raptor. It’s basically a little toy on the sidebar which allows us to remember some Raptors history, lest we forget. On every visit to any page in the site we randomly pick a player that played for the club and give you the option to see his exploits without leaving the page. So far there are 134 such players (would’ve been 135 but poor Jamal Sampson didn’t make it) so as you’re browsing the site keep an eye on it to see what Raptor you got served. We’ll be adding pictures of each one soon.

Finally, the response to the polls has been pretty good (over 220 votes) and most of you feel that Jermaine O’Neal’s addition is the thing to be excited about. Very close race for #2 as “Not Excited” beat out “Bargnani’s bulk” by three votes. Since that issue is decided, its time to move on and get your take on something else.

What would be considered a successful season?

Playoff appearance

1st round win

1st round win, good fight in 2nd round

2nd round win

2nd round win, good fight in EC finals

EC Champs

This is just to gauge the fans’ expectations of just how good you think this Raptors team is.

We’ve also added some new features to the Stat-O-Meter 3000, most notably the ability to filter by pace adjusted statistics. I’d like to thank supersub15 from RealGM for his input on the tool.

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Rap of the Day

This I can explain. His low usage rate when he is on the floor minimize his impact on team stats, such as team O/D rating and even plus minus (since that stat also accounts for the other members of the rotation. However, when he is being used, his individual stats, or the stats that are only dependant on his contributions, he looks pretty good, pretty great even.

Basically, like what everyone else has been saying, it comes down to usage rate. Involve him enough in the offense and there's no reason why his individual efficiency won't be reflected in the team stats.

Now here's where you might say "but the raptors lose more when he shoots more than average, so the usage rate argument doesn't hold up". That's a fair point, but I would argue that Jonas often gets those extra field goals when A) the guards are putting up a ton of bricks and Jonas is cleaning the glass, or B) he's a last resort after its clear that the other scoring options aren't working. In both scenarios, the team as a whole is playing below average, so it makes sense that they would win a lower percentage of games.